Fake refugees given deadline to apply for further protection
EXCLUSIVE: Up to 7500 boat people living in Australia have been given a four-month deadline to lodge claims for asylum or they will have their welfare axed and be booted out of Australia.
NSW
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UP TO 7500 boat people living in Australia have been given a four-month deadline to lodge claims for asylum or they will have their welfare axed and be booted out of Australia.
The Sunday Telegraph can reveal Immigration Minister Peter Dutton has issued an ultimatum to thousands of asylum seekers who have been living in Australia for as long as five years without progressing their claims for refugee status.
Mr Dutton said it was the last chance for the boat people to prove they were refugees.
“Australians won’t be taken for mugs,” Mr Dutton said.
He has given the asylum seekers until October 1 to lodge a claim for a Temporary Protection Visa or Safe Haven Enterprise Visa.
If they fail to do so, the Turnbull government will assume they no longer want to seek protection in Australia and will kick them out.
Asylum seekers who fail to apply for visas by the due date will also be banned from applying for any Australian visa and will no longer be eligible for welfare payments.
“If people are serious, they submit their claims. If they are trying it on, they refuse to lodge an application.”
More than 17,000 boat people are receiving Centrelink payments under the Status Resolution Support Services.
In 2015-16 payments for asylum seekers cost taxpayers about $249 million.
Illegal maritime arrivals who refuse to submit applications will be placed on short term visas while they make arrangements to leave Australia.
During that time they will have access only to basic services including free education for school-aged children.
Mr Dutton said Australian taxpayers should not have to provide financial support to people who had no right to be here.
“Many Australians would question why people claiming to be fleeing persecution, supposedly desperate enough to pay people smugglers, would not actively seek protection despite being in Australia for years.
“They should lodge a protection application — so their claims can be tested — or leave,” he said.
“If people are serious, they submit their claims. If they are trying it on, they refuse to lodge an application.”
Between 2008 and 2013 under the Rudd-Gillard Labor governments, about 50,000 asylum seekers arrived by boat.
More than 30,000 asylum seekers are still living on bridging visas in the community waiting to be processed.
About 23,000 of them have applied for protection but about 7500 are yet to make a claim for asylum.
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